Pages

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Pretty Enough - A Moment in Time

Over twenty years ago I was riding in the car with my best friend thinking, she is so beautiful, her skin looks so soft. I wonder how she keeps her skin looking so good. It looks completely unblemished; smooth.

I wonder if she is wearing makeup. I wonder if she knows how beautiful her skin looks, I'm sure she must. I wish my skin looked like hers, I should just ask her what she uses on her skin. I can't do that: she will think I'm silly.

She always seems so put together and nothing affects her. I wonder how she does it. We both have children, we both have demanding men in our lives, how can she take the time to do all that she does to keep herself looking so good?

I wish I had time to take care of myself better. I wish I could afford better cleaning and moisturizing products for my skin. I wish I could afford better makeup. I wonder if she washes her face every night? They say that it helps your skin if you wash your face before going to bed. I always forget to wash my face before going to bed. I wish I was better at remembering to wash up before bed.

I really need to take better care of myself, maybe if I did I would have nice skin like hers. It just looks so flawless. It really glows. I must start taking better care of myself and then maybe just maybe my skin will at least look better even if it can't look as good as hers.

"What do you use on your face?" My friend asked. "I mean it looks so good, are you wearing makeup?"

My mouth fell open. "Are you kidding me? I was just looking at your face and thinking how great it looked and wishing my face looked as smooth as yours. Are you wearing any makeup?" I asked.

She smiled and said, "No I'm not and I can't believe you think my skin looks good."

I smiled back at her. It really made me wonder what society was doing to us that we didn't think we looked good enough; that we weren't pretty enough as we were, either of us. I never forgot that moment; that moment when each of us thought the other looked better and we couldn't see our own beauty.

14 comments:

Oh, I can't decide if this makes me sad or happy. It's so unfortunate that we are so programmed to see the beauty in other people but not ourselves. At the same time, it's great that the two of you shared that moment, that vulnerability, and are now more aware of the insecurities we all feel.

This is beautifully written. The internal dialogue spells out the confusion, insecurity, and envy perfectly. Then the transition to verbal dialogue and the realization of a common insecurity...wow.

It makes me sad, though. On several levels. One, that women are programmed not to accept compliments by saying, "Thank you," but instead, by denying it and saying, "Oh, no, I look so awful." Two, that most of us really are insecure enough that we do this because we need the reassurance that follows. And three, that we don't talk about it more and realize that we all feel this way from time to time.

I love this. The others said why at least as well as I could at the moment, but I needed to post and add, Thank you, Morgan. This was good in the purest sense of the word, in heart, spirit...texture. This was incredible.

You've zeroed in on women and beauty, which is a huge topic in and of itself...

In my case (which I am sure is not isolated) I had several boyfriends who kept my insecurities alive by telling me that I was fat, ugly and so forth - but they "loved" me anyway. ("You're nothing to look at and your boobs are too small, but you've a great personality," they'd say, for instance. Having been raised in America and teased in High School, I had no idea that any man could find something less than a D cup sexy!)

I look back at photos of myself at these allegedly fat and ugly times and laugh because I was thin and rather cute - if I do say so, myself. It makes me sad and angry that I was belittled into feeling otherwise. What I saw in the mirror was a reflection of their ideas, alas, not what was actually there.

I think that, in one relationship in particular, I was made to feel ugly as a way of keeping me under control. He did it out of his fear that I'd leave him if I knew I was cute, I guess.

Anyway...

I used to keep all my compliments to myself and assume that other people, both male and female, knew how beautiful/smart/kind/uplifting/wonderful/[insert positive trait here] they were.

Once I had my coffeehouse, I realized that people have no idea about these things! It's one of the things I miss the most about living in Italy is that giving other people compliments is a huge part of their culture.

Well... I've rambled so long in my comment here, Morgan, that I think I may have to do a blog post on this topic, as well.

Thanks for the insight and inspiration - as always. Btw, have I told you lately that you are beautiful, insightful, fiery, energetic and just plain wonderful?

Loved your long sharing of words Tui! It reminds me of our early comments back and forth with each other and how I often left a lengthy reply. Sometimes we just have a lot to say. :D

My heart goes out to that younger you that had men in her life tell her she wasn't beautiful. You are beautiful, both inside and out, truly. I never thought I was beautiful but it wasn't because of the men in my life. I felt like I was fat and not very smart. I look back at pictures during this time in my life and I am amazed. I was 5'8" and only 135. That is not fat. The not very smart part was due to a man. I think he was threatened by a woman with a brain especially one that might be as smart or smarter than he was. We both took the GED together and I scored higher three out of five and even though his average was still higher it nearly killed him. He spent the next ten years finding little ways to undermine my intelligence. I finally wizened up and left.

I hope I you do write a post about all that you shared above because you have often inspired me to do the same.

I keep hearing little tidbits about this coffeehouse and I am dying to hear more.

LinkWithin

Follow by Email

Welcome

Grab a cup of tea or coffee (oh what the heck, get a danish too!) and sit a spell. You might want to grab your notebook and pen because you never know when you will be inspired to write down a quote, or jot down a poem of your own. Words are like that, they take you on a journey and the next thing you know you are breathing life into your own magical world of words.